UoSAT-OSCAR 9
Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL) celebrated the 30th anniversary of the launch of Surrey’s first satellite, UoSAT-1. Launched into orbit on 6th October 1981, UoSAT-1 was designed and built by a team from the University of Surrey led by SSTL founder Sir Martin Sweeting, G3YJO.
UoSAT-1 was also known as UoSAT-OSCAR 9. It was a scientific and educational low-Earth orbit satellite containing many experiments and beacons but no amateur transponders. UO-9 was fully operational until it re-entered October 13, 1989 from a decaying orbit after nine years of service.
UO-9′s mission scored several firsts for technology which would be incorporated into future amateur satellite missions including:
+ The first on-board computer (IHU – Integrated Housekeeping Unit)
+ Battery and attitude management
+ Remote control, and experiments
+ First S-band beacon
+ It carried a CCD camera, a Digitalker speech synthesizer, and transmitted telemetry data on a 145.826 MHz beacon at 1200 baud using asynchronous AFSK.
UoSAT-1 team at Vandenberg Air Force Base
Amateur Satellite Operators are also familiar with later SSTL UoSAT developments:
+ UoSAT-2 was designated as UO-11 which can still be heard operating on 145.825 MHz with a beacon transmitting 1200 baud using asynchronous AFSK.
+ UoSAT-3 was designated as UO-14 (no longer operational) and featured an FM Voice Repeater with 145.9750 MHz uplink and 435.0700 MHz downlink.
More history can be found in an interesting article posted on the SpaceDaily.com website: http://tinyurl.com/3urdd9o
Read the SSTL Press Release http://www.sstl.co.uk/news-and-events?story=1899
Thanks to ANS and SSTL for the above information
AMSAT-UK publishes a colour A4 newsletter, OSCAR News, which is full of Amateur Satellite information.
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